Syracuse’s 49-44 win over Miami on Saturday at the Carrier Dome looked more like one of those knock-down, drag-out Big East battles. It certainly wasn’t what the ACC has always advertised, being a more free-flowing, offensive basketball league.

The ACC encore for the second-ranked Orange (14-0, 1-0) happens Tuesday at 9 p.m. and this time it’s on the road in Blacksburg, Va., where Virginia Tech awaits. The Hokies are 8-5 and 1-0 under second-year coach James Johnson, whose squad returns three starters from an outfit that went 13-19 and 4-14 in the ACC last year. Like Miami and SU, they’re a former Big East school. Virginia Tech’s only league game was a 61-60 overtime triumph at Miami on Dec. 8.

In that game, the hard-luck Hurricanes (8-6, 0-2) led by eight points at halftime. They were up five points with six minutes left at Syracuse, but the Orange rallied as C.J. Fair, Tyler Ennis and Rakeem Christmas made key plays late.

“When you go 3-for-15 from the 3-point line, you’ve got to find a way to win,” coach Jim Boeheim said on Monday’s ACC conference call. “We made plays when we had to.”

Miami’s matchup zone gave SU problems. How the Orange and Trevor Cooney, in particular, bounce back will be important. Cooney, the sophomore guard who entered Saturday making 50 percent of his 3-point shots, went 2-for-12.

“I’ve just got to hang strong,” said Cooney, who shot only 26 percent from beyond the arc last year. “Guys kept finding me, telling me to shoot and I’ve just got to keep shooting.”

His issues created a ripple because SU doesn’t have another reliable deep threat. That allowed Miami to clog the lane and even Orange players wondered afterward if other ACC foes may mimic that matchup zone defensive strategy.

Syracuse played three games in Hawaii in winning the Maui Invitational and also scratched out a 68-63 win over St. John’s at Madison Square Garden on Dec. 15. Tuesday will be its first game on the campus of its opponent. But the Orange have showed themselves something in two recent wins. No deficit is too much to come back from (they trailed Villanova by 18) and they can win even when their offensive is off, as it was against Miami.